The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Nurse ‘stable’ as deadly disease again identified
Pauline Cafferkey flown to London on military plane for urgent treatment
Ebola nurse Pauline Cafferkey is being treated in London after falling ill for a third time.
An RAF aircraft transported Ms Cafferkey, who is said to be in a stable condition, to the Royal Free Hospital where she has been treated twice before.
The nurse, originally from Fife, was infected with the deadly disease while working in Sierra Leone in December 2014 and spent almost a month fighting for her life in an isolation unit.
She was released after recovering but fell critically ill again last October, and was treated for meningitis caused by the ebola virus.
The 40-year-old recovered enough to be discharged and was transferred to Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth University Hospital to continue her recuperation and later returned home.
Yesterday it emerged she had been re-admitted after “routine monitoring” identified a problem.
An NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde spokesman said: “Ms Cafferkey was admitted to the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital under routine monitoring by the infectious diseases unit. She is undergoing further investigations and her condition remains stable.”
Ms Cafferkey, whose family comes from Crossgates, contracted the virus while working as a nurse at the Save the Children treatment centre in Kerry Town, Sierra Leone.
At the time of her re-admission last year, Dr Michael Jacobs, from the Royal Free, described it as “unprecedented”.
The World Health Organisation declared the ebola outbreak over last year after the deaths of thousands of people but two new cases emerged in Sierra Leone last month.
The organisation called for a “critical period of heightened vigilance”.
Dr Derek Gatherer, lecturer in biomedical and life sciences at Lancaster University, said he was “very sad to hear” that Ms Cafferkey has been admitted to hospital again.
“It is now becoming clear that ebola is a far more complex disease than we previously imagined,” he said.
“The meningitis that Ms Cafferkey suffered from at the end of last year is one of the most serious complications of all, as it can be life-threatening.
“She was unlucky enough to be one of only a handful of patients in whom it has been seen.”